Cleaning the Fireplace, Language Classes, A Bike Ride, 30 cents and Free Coffee

On Monday, it was time to clean the fireplace. This meant that after the ashes were shoveled out and everything was vacuumed (in the fireplace), Paulina donned old clothes and a shower cap and Heiko promptly shoved her into the fireplace while I bit my tongue stopping the comparisons of this with Nazis.







This week I began language classes in Worms. I have them twice a week on Monday and Thursday evenings from 5:30 to 9. They are a real experience. Because they are German classes, they are of course, in German. This is also because of the wide range of pupil nationality. From my count, there are between 4 and 6 Poles, a Montenegran, two Kosovoans, a couple Turks, and me. That means that German is the common language, not English, or Ibanisch or Turkish... There is a lot of motioning by the teacher and repeating of what her message is. There are actually two teachers, Barbara and Jens, who take turns teaching. It is about a ten minute walk from the train station to the school so I must be speedy to catch the 9:25 train. If I miss that, I must wait until 10:25 for the next train.

Today was Saturday, which meant I get to sleep in. Except Daniel had a friend stay the night (they're three...) and they woke up around 8 and promptly decided to run laps on the floor outside my room. I even got to shout 'AUS!' when one of them opened my door and screamed. Luckily the eye of the storm passed and I was able to sleep through the rest of the morning. I woke up in time for an amazing lunch of Spargel (white asparagus) Soup. Nothing was planned for the afternoon, so I decided to go for a bike ride through the hills around Wintersheim. Leaves are changing colors and the air is getting crisp. Oh, I brought my camera along, enjoy.







There are four windmills to the north of Wintersheim.







Later in the afternoon, I went to Worms, this time with my ukulele in hand. My mission was to panhandle. I had no goal but to play. Many people passed, but one person, who had earbuds in his ears, put 30 cents in my case as he walked by. Nice guy.

Then, I went to the doner kebap shop and had myself a doner. The doner maker, or doner king if you will, struck up a conversation with me and he's a pretty nice Turkish man who knows English. When I was finished with my doner, he asked, "Do you want some tea? My pleasure!" I'm not much of a tea person, but I didn't want to come across as a bad guy, so I asked if I could have some coffee instead. While the coffee cup did have lipstick stains on it, I put it past me as it was a free cup of coffee. I'll be frequenting this doner kebap shop again.

Tomorrow, I'll join the family for church. This will be the first time the Dettweiler's have gone to church since I got here. The service will celebrate the fruits of the harvest.

Until next time,
Jon